Call for Papers

During the last decades, decisions on Intellectual Property (IP) management have proved to be critical to appropriate new value and secure return on investment. Whereas IP management traditionally focused on allowing freedom of operation in R&D and mitigating the risk of imitation by competitors, firms increasingly apply it in combination with business strategy to fence or steer technological paths (Blind et al., 2006, 2009; Kingston, 2001; Cohen et al., 2002) to operate on secondary markets for technology (Arora et al., 2001; Gans et al., 2002) to create conditions for competitive advantage (Teece, 2000); and to experience new IP-based business models (Chesbrough, 2006). As a result, IP decisions often have dramatic consequences for a firm's business that reach far beyond the legal aspects of an IP-related dispute. Moreover, numerous business examples suggest that critical IP decisions might change the development of entire industries such as ICT and biotechnology.

From an organizational perspective, IP management seeks to create the right appropriability conditions and requires for the blending together of competences in corporate law, business development, marketing, R&D, and technology management (Pisano, 2006; Di Minin & Bianchi, 2011). In addition, companies are continuously in need of new IP management practices that allow them to respond to new management paradigms such as open innovation, co-creation, and networked innovation (Chesbrough, 2003). Some scholars even argue that recent developments such as the emergence of open source and user driven innovation ask for a fundamental rethinking of our IP system. Fauchart and von Hippel (2008), for instance, point to the emergence of norm-based intellectual property systems next to law-based IP systems.

The purpose of this sub-theme is therefore to bring together a collection of conceptual, quantitative and qualitative papers on how firms individually and jointly organize their IP activities. This colloquium should foster rich conversation among a group of junior and senior scholars from around the globe on this particular topic. We encourage scholars to not only consider traditional modes of intellectual property (i.e. patenting), but also to look at alternative modes of intellectual property management such as the use of trademarks or the adoption of secrecy strategies. We also would like to emphasize our intention to bring together studies that look at IP management at different levels of analysis (firm level, interfirm level, network level). Finally, we strongly encourage scholars to not only look at the benefits of IP practices, strategies, and business models, but also to consider the potential dark side of IP (e.g. abuse of monopoly position, restricted access to new innovations in developing countries, costs of IP, use of IP to avoid corporate taxes).

References

Arora, Asish, Andrea Fosfuri & Alfonso Gambardella (2001): Markets for Technology: The Economics of Innovation and Corporate Strategy. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

Blind, Knut, Jakob Edler, Rainer Frietsch & Ulrich Schmoch (2006): 'Motives to patent: Evidence from Germany.' Research Policy, 35 (5), pp. 655–672.

Blind, Knut, Katrin Cremers & Elisabeth Mueller (2009): 'The influence of strategic patenting on companies' patent portfolios.' Research Policy, 38 (2), pp. 428–436.

Chesbrough, Henry William (2003): Open Innovation. The New Imperative for Creating and Profiting from Technology. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

Chesbrough, Henry William (2006): 'New puzzles and new findings.' In: Henry William Chesbrough, Wim Vanhaverbeke & Joel West (eds.): Open Innovation: Researching a new Paradigm. Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 15–35.

Cohen, Wesley M., Akira Goto, Akiya Nagata, Richard R. Nelson & John P. Walsh (2002): 'R&D spillovers, patents and the incentives to innovate in Japan and the United States.' Research Policy, 31 (8-9), pp. 1349–1367.

Di Minin, Alberto & Mattia Bianchi (2011): 'Safe nests in global nets: Internationalization and appropriability of R&D in wireless telecom.' Journal of International Business Studies, 42, pp. 910–934.

Fauchart, Emmanuelle & Eric von Hippel (2008): 'Norms-Based Intellectual Property Systems: The Case of French Chefs.' Organization Science, 19 (2), pp. 187–201.

Gans, Joshua S., David H. Hsu & Scott Stern (2002): 'When does start-up innovation spur the gale of creative destruction?' The RAND Journal of Economics, 33 (4), pp. 571–586.

Kingston, Willliam (2001): 'Innovation needs patents reform.' Research Policy, 30 (3), pp. 403–423.

Pisano, Gary (2006): 'Profiting from innovation and the intellectual property revolution.' Research Policy, 35 (8), pp. 1122–1130.

Teece, David J. (1986): 'Profiting from technological innovation: Implications for integration, collaboration, licensing and public policy.' Research Policy, 15 (6), pp. 285–305.